


Onion Ball

by HerenorThereNearnorFar



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Beaches, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-11
Updated: 2015-04-11
Packaged: 2018-03-22 10:37:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3725653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HerenorThereNearnorFar/pseuds/HerenorThereNearnorFar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Beach City kids spend a day at the eponymous Beach and try to recreate Jenny's childhood. They find little success at first but with perseverance and the power of friendship they learn just how aerodynamic an Onion can be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Onion Ball

"Come on." he pleaded. "The water is nice."

"I don't know." Connie said, shielding her book from the water dripping from her friend's hair. "I don't really like swimming."

"You don't swim in the ocean, you play. Coonnnie! You liked the waterpark my dad took us to."

The girl sighed. "I do have a bathing suit my mom made me bring.... Fine, I'll give it a shot."

A few tourists turned their heads at the screech of delight coming from a child with dark hair and rash guard that bulged suspiciously over his bellybutton, almost revealing the outline of something faceted and mineral. 

(Greg had instituted the rash guard rule after he got a few too many huffy remarks about ridiculous piercings and children.)

 

 

The giggles faded as they walked out of the water, rubbing eyes and stepping gently in an attempt to keep the coating of sand to a minimum. 

"You want fries, right?" Steven asked. 

Connie nodded, still smiling. "Lattice, please."

Steven bowed. "Of course, Queen Connie."

"No, no." Connie laughed. "We were playing mermaids. I don't think mermaids bow."

"Why not?" her friend frowned. "I was a mermaid knight. Knights bow. I read it in that book series, about the prince who ran away and joined the revolution, the one you gave me."

"Yes. But fish don't bow."

"Well," Steven opined, a glint in his eyes that suggested he had just come to a brilliant conclusion. "We don't know that. We've never seen how fish act around fish royalty."

Another round of giggles followed, interrupted by a shout from a blanket set up a few feet away. 

"Hey, Steven!"

"Hi Jenny!" the boy waved back, running over with Connie in tow. "Hi Buck. Hi Sour Cream."

"Yo."

"Hey, dude."

Jenny patted the blanket. "Come sit with us, Steven."

Buck nodded in agreement. "We're chilling."

Steven looked to Connie, who was hanging back and looking around warily, in askance. "Sorry Jenny, Connie and I were going to get fries."

Sour Cream lifted a container of french fries and shook it. "Well, we aren't going to eat these."

"Aren't they yours?" Steven asked, confused.

"I don't do potatoes." Sour Cream said with a wave of his hand. "Not my thing."

"They had ketchup, I'm not eating tomatoes this week." Jenny piped up.

Buck adjusted his shades. "They're just a symbol of mainstream consumer culture, man." 

"Why did you buy them then?" Connie said, so softly it seemed she had barely spoken at all. 

Looking to his compatriots, who gave him blank stares, Sour Cream shrugged. "Seemed like a good idea at the time."

"Oh." Steven gave Connie an pleading expression. "Well, we wouldn't want to waste fries, right Connie?"

"I guess." Connie said. 

"Cool. Sour Cream, Jenny, Buck, you know Connie, right? Connie, this is Buck and Sour Cream and-"

"I think she gets the picture, kid." Jenny grinned. "Hey, Connie. Nice to have you hanging with us."

Connie smiled slowly, manners taking over, and sat next to Jenny. Steven plopped down next to her and Sour Cream passed over the fries and started a vague conversation about music. (It transpired that Jenny knew a lot about modern death metal and german opera and was not afraid to talk about it. Buck claimed to find everything too mainstream but got really defensive on the subject of country. Connie was only allowed to listen to classical music and very carefully vetted 90s rap her father enjoyed. Steven liked everything, except metal music. Jenny had to steal one of his fries for that, ketchup or not.)

As they reached the bottom of the fries Steven stood. "Connie, want to go back to the ocean?"

"I'm just saying, Mozart's Magic Flute gets really boring after the twentieth time you listened to it-" Connie looked over. "Yeah, sure Steven. What do you want to play this time?"

Jenny, suddenly deprived of her conversation partner, glanced over as well. "Your dad here Steven?"

"No, why?"

Jenny sat up, eyes getting distant. "When I was your age at the beach my dad used to throw me and Kiki. He could get us like, twenty feet. It was pretty fun."

"That does sound fun." Steven agreed. "Garnet throws me sometimes. Amethyst too. But never in the ocean. Too bad my dad's working."

"My mom would throw a fit if my dad did that." Connie sighed.

"I could get one of the gems..." Steven trailed off. "No, that's probably a bad idea."

"You guys are small." Buck said, sitting up as well. Much to the surprise of everyone as he had been quiet for the past twenty minutes. Steven and Connie had built a small sand castle on his stomach. "I bet anyone could throw you."

There was much significant glancing between everyone. 

"This isn't really a swim suit for water." Jenny said mournfully, staring down at her physics defying bikini. "And Buck is just wearing his normal clothes."

"All swim suits are for water." Steven declared cheerfully. 

"Man, what's life without a little adventure and a little swimming in your clothes?" Buck stood and fixed his hair. 

"Yay!"

 

 

Splash!

"Look in my defense, I don't have a lot of practice at this." Sour Cream said, looking at Steven who was a very short distance away.

"I thought that was better." Steven said encouragingly. "I went like, two feet."

"Here, try my girl Connie. She's a little smaller." Jenny suggested Before Connie could protest Sour Cream grabbed her and heaved her at the horizon. She surfaced, sputtering, just a little farther than where Steven had landed. More of a drop than an actual trajectory. 

"Please don't do that again." she said, blinking salt water out of her eyes.

Sour Cream nodded agreeably, clearly distracted and maybe a little distraught.

"Hey, man. At least you could pick them up." Buck consoled. 

Jenny frowned. "You know, you guys might be a little bigger than Kiki and I were."

"We need someone smaller than Connie then." Steven mused. "I know just the man, come on!"

 

 

Peedee Fryman looked at the three dripping teenagers and two equally dripping children in front of him. 

"Steven, I have a shift."

"Pleassse?"

"No." the boy said firmly, crossing his arms. "I'm not going to let my dad down."

Steven narrowed his eyes. "But if you didn't have a shift you would do it?"

"Er, sure?"

The young Universe leaned into the window and stared at Ronaldo, sitting in a chair near the back door and tapping frantically on his phone. "Ronaldo, we're friends, can you take Peedee's shift so we can go throw him into the ocean?"

"Steven, I am working. Don't interrupt genius." Ronaldo hissed without looking away from the little screen. 

Steven turned to the others. "Sorry guys."

The cool kids exchanged a significant look. 

"Your turn or mine?" Jenny asked Buck, who gave a nonchalant shrug in return. She held out her hands, one fisted and resting in the curved palm of the other. "Loser's job then."

(Little known fact: Buck Dewey was really good at Rock-Paper-Scissors.)

"Ronaldo!" Jenny called past an increasingly confused and irate young Fryman. "We're taking your brother to help us with something. Cover his shift for me?"

The young man's angry response stopped before it started and he blinked. "Uh, sure Jenny." 

Peedee frowned and Steven smiled. "Come on, it'll be fun. Everyone needs a break. We'll get ice cream after."

The scowl slowly faded from the child's face. "Okay, let me get my swimsuit."

 

Splash!

"That was almost four feet. Definite improvement." Steven said thoughtfully. Peedee shook the water out of his hair. 

"Can we get ice cream now?"

"Let me try." Jenny said, reaching for Peedee. She got him a little farther but not a lot. 

"How big do you remember being, exactly?" Connie asked her as Buck made his own, objectively pathetic, attempt at the child shot put. 

Jenny tried to count, fingers doing complex arithmetic, and eventually gave up. "I don't know. It's kind of fuzzy."

"Right."

Peedee swam over. "Can we please give up now? I'm getting dizzy."

"I guess." Jenny sighed. "Thanks for being cool about this, Peedee."

Steven tried to comfort her. "My dad says it's always all right to bail. We're just too big and mature to be thrown."

Resigned to failure, the six began wading, or doggy paddling, back to the shore, only to find two people waiting for them. 

Kiki Pizza waved and the small figure next to her remained silent, as was his habit. "Sour Cream, your brother's been looking for you."

Onion nodded in agreement. 

Jenny sidled up, trying to avoid the little boy's gaze. "And he asked you to help?"

"Yeah." Kiki said, "He came up to me after at the restaurant and wanted to know if I knew where you guys were today. So I helped him look."

(Onion liked Kiki for some reason. At least he was usually a bit less destructive when she was around and she could usually get what he was saying. Onion and Sour Cream's mother had once said that they were kindred spirits. No one really knew what to make of that statement. No one really wanted to know, but they did treat Kiki a bit more carefully after that.) 

Sour Cream went over to his brother and Onion tugged on his pants, pulling him down. Kneeling obligingly Sour Cream leaned over and Onion whispered something in his ear. 

"No, I don't know where the fire extinguisher is."

Another bout of whispering. 

"I guess?"

The two brothers continued talking and Kiki turned to Jenny. "So what were you doing? And why is Buck soaking wet?"

The other twin snorted. "None of your business."Kiki’s face fell and Jenny relented. "We were seeing if we could throw the kids, the way dad used to throw us when we were small."

Kiki glanced at Steven, Peedee, and Connie, who were wrapped in towels and now haggling with an ice cream truck. "They're way too big for that."

"We know that now!" Jenny said angrily. Buck laid a hand on her shoulder and she calmed down. "Shame there isn't anyone smaller."

Sour Cream looked up from a bout of laconic whispering with Onion. "Jenny, I have an idea."

"What-" she looked at Onion. So did Kiki and Buck. "Oh."

The kids returned, bearing ice cream, and noted the silence. 

"What's up guys?" Steven said.

"We have someone small enough to throw." Jenny breathed reverently. 

 

 

Onion agreed to the plan worryingly fast and they were all out in the ocean within a few minutes, Kiki and Peedee had even stuck around on the grounds that they both had a shift off now anyway.

Sour Cream lifted his brother carefully into the air and tossed him. He flew at least a dozen feet, slashing down next to Jenny. Everyone held their breaths. 

Onion surfaced and gave them a thumbs up, then held his arms out to Jenny, a silent plea to be thrown again. She obliged.

Splash! 

Back to Sour Cream. Then Kiki, then Buck. Steven and Connie made a fair effort and Peedee dropped Onion, earning himself a look of intense disappointment. Back to Jenny who managed to catapult Onion right into Sour Cream's arms. Connie giggled and Steven grinned, mirroring the smiles everyone else was sporting. There was a taste of victory in the air. 

As Kiki made another throw the rules began to emerge. Every player for themselves, both distance and accuracy counted in the tally that no one could properly keep. You yelled out the name of the person you were throwing Onion too and Connie, Steven, and Peedee roamed the area, trying to intercept him. If you could catch Onion when he was thrown to you and accurately throw him to another person you earned... well nothing. But it was fun.

"Buck!" Jenny shouted, hefting Onion and tossing him. He landed near Connie, who shoved him towards Kiki. Buck made a desperate dive and recovered Onion. 

"Nice one." Steven said thoughtfully. Buck nodded, acknowledging the compliment of his Onion throwing skills.

"Sour Cream, catch." This throw went off course completely and Jenny grabbed Onion. 

"Throw better! Sour Cream!" Onion was hurled at his brother and landed perfectly, Peedee's attempts to push him towards Buck notwithstanding. 

Kiki laughed "Over here!"

"Over here." Jenny ordered.

"No man, to me." Buck said, pushing his sunglasses up his nose.

"Throw him!" Connie yelled and Steven and Peedee agreed. 

Sour Cream wound up his arm, shouted a name, and threw Onion. 

 

 

Peridot's Log No. 6789

Observation of the Crystal Gems and the Steven(Nature:Unknown) Report:

Today I observed the beach near the Crystal Gem's base, under careful cover of course. It is crawling with humans, clearly they are hiding in plain sight. The Steven was among them, participating in their rituals.(Evidence of humanity?) He was accompanied by several human juveniles, picking up many more over the course of the day.(Juveniles, the non-fully developed stage of several species, including humans.) Some of them seemed closer to maturity and one barely seemed out of infancy.(Note: Probability is high that humans bear live young but it must be investigated further.) They performed several strange acts, some correlating to previous documentation (Including metabolizing fuel, socializing.) and some that have no backing in previous research.(Including sitting in the sun despite health risks, acting out elaborate ritual story about beings that are half fish and half human.(Note: No prior reports of these beings. Must investigate if they are real or primitive folklore. This really is not my field.)) The strangest was definitely the ritual where they threw the youngest of their number at each other. Although they enacted this in the water, probably for cushioning purposes, this is still a large risk as humans are highly fragile.(And squishy. It is rather disgusting) It must be a large part of their culture. Appalled by this display and worried about discovery I retreated. 

I still can't find Jasper or the prisoner Lapis Lazuli. It they are in the custody of the Crystal Gems I have seen no evidence of it.

I suspect my reports aren't getting through. 

This world is highly disturbing. I request pickup at the soonest possible time.(Once again.)


End file.
